Kaiser Permanente Vietnamese MD's honor Tet holiday and community

Dr. Christina Le doesn’t normally wear an ao dai to her Kaiser Permanente Milpitas medical office, but she wore the traditional Vietnamese gown when she and 14 other Vietnamese Kaiser Permanente doctors brought Thrive to the San Jose Vietnamese Tet Festival at the Santa Clara County Fairgrounds recently.
Tet is the start of the Lunar New Year for Vietnamese families, a day for celebrations and family gatherings, and the doctors, who are the Kaiser Permanente Vietnamese Physician Ambassadors wanted to show the community that KP embraces their Vietnamese culture.
San Jose, California has the largest Vietnamese population of any city in the United States, more than 100,000 people. And with over 60,000 visitors to the annual Tet Festival, Kaiser Permanente’s Vietnamese physicians wanted to share with everyone the value of being a Kaiser Permanente member.
“At our San Jose and Santa Clara medical centers alone, there are more than two dozen Vietnamese primary care and specialty physicians, and we’re committed to delivering the most culturally appropriate care for our Vietnamese patients”, said Dr. Dao Nguyen, a pediatrician and Chief of Health Promotion at Kaiser Permanente San Jose. “We wanted every Vietnamese family to know that they will feel welcome at our medical centers.”
As a sponsor of the Tet Festival, Kaiser Permanente occupied 1000 sq. feet of the Expo hall. Multimedia screens ran videos narrated in Vietnamese about Kaiser Permanente and biographies of the Vietnamese physicians. The space was decorated with traditional Tet decorations including peach blossoms, a symbol of prosperity and good fortune in Vietnam; banners and colorful give-away bags all marked with “doi song khoe đep”, a free translation of Kaiser Permanente’s Thrive motto, meaning a beautiful, healthy life.
As children did arts and crafts in a special games area of the Kaiser Permanente display, Dr. Le and the other physicians engaged over 6000 visitors to the KP area. The physicians spent additional time to talk with nearly 800 Vietnamese families about their health concerns including cancer and hepatitis B screenings, tobacco cessation, chronic disease management and healthy lifestyles.
“A lot of our patients were at the Festival, and they told us they are very satisfied with their care at Kaiser Permanente,” said Dr. Nguyen. “Others we spoke with said Kaiser Permanente’s health insurance has a good reputation in the community, and they’d consider joining.”
All of the physicians and volunteers from the Kaiser Permanente San Jose and Santa Clara medical centers who participated at the Tet Festival enjoyed the opportunity to interact and celebrate this important holiday with the Vietnamese community. On behalf of our Kaiser Permanente family, we wish everyone a Happy and Healthy New Year! Chuc Mung Nam Moi!